therefore, the President will be compelled
to create voters; and, if he shall enfranchise any of the white
non-voters, can he not also enfranchise the loyal black non-voters?

Let us watch and pray without ceasing. Let us hope that the day will
dawn, and that soon, when law shall be found on the side of justice to
the black race. These objectors never questioned McClellan's military
right to put down slave insurrections with an "iron hand," or Halleck's
infamous Order No. 3 to drive all negroes outside the military lines. It
was only when Generals Fremont, Hunter and others declared the slaves
free, that they might cripple the rebel armies and add them to our Union
forces, that the cry of no law, no power was raised. Thus it is clear
that the blindness and inability to find rightful authority, civil or
military, first to emancipate, then to arm, and now to enfranchise the
negroes, have the one source. Slavery perpetrated the "sum of all
villainies" on the negroes, and then, to justify its wickedness, filled
the whole land with atrocious lies of their depraved and degraded
nature. The American people consented to the outrage; and their
continued prejudice against that oppressed race but proves the adage,
"we hate those whom we have injured."

Last of all comes the objection that the old masters will influence the
vote of the negroes, and that, therefore, to enfranchise them will but
give increased power to the old lords of the lash. Do not believe such
nonsense. Think you, men who for four years have withstood every
possible temptation and torture to induce them to fight for the slave
oligarchy, can now be wheedled into voting for it? No, no. Those loyal,
brave, black men who have known enough to fight on the right side will
know enough to vote on the right side; and it is because the aiders and
abettors of the old slave power believe and know that the negroes will
be an invincible host on the side of equality, that they thus fear them.

We never from the beginning have had a genuine republican form of
government in any State in the Union; for in no State have "the people"
ever been permitted to elect their representatives. Even in
Massachusetts and Vermont, the States nearest republican, only one-half
of the people, the "male inhabitants," are allowed to vote. In other
States it is only all "free white male persons," and in others still,
all "free white male inhabitants owning so many slaves or so much
property." It i